


Windmills of the Mind

by faithinthepoor



Series: Popular [3]
Category: Popular (TV)
Genre: F/F
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-01-08
Updated: 2013-01-08
Packaged: 2017-11-24 03:41:08
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,469
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/629984
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/faithinthepoor/pseuds/faithinthepoor
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Set during Timber!</p>
            </blockquote>





	Windmills of the Mind

**Author's Note:**

> Follows [An Analysis of Evil](http://archiveofourown.org/works/629934) and [Leading Nowhere](http://archiveofourown.org/works/629941)

They say you can’t always get what you want and she understands that, that was a lesson that she learnt long ago, even before the universe conspired to bludgeon her over the head and took her father from her in an effort to ensure that she truly comprehended the meaning of this particular homily. She knows that nothing lasts forever and life is but an endless series of comprises and sacrifices, when it’s not being an outright disappointment, and while this may not make her happy, she has come to accept it. What she doesn’t understand is why no-one took the time to explain to her just how hard it is to know what you really want – it wasn’t one of the lessons that her parents taught to her, she doesn’t recall it be the essence of the parables that she has been told and it isn’t the title or really even the focus of any songs that she is aware of. She feels that her lack of knowledge on this topic has left her vulnerable and bereft, ill-prepared to deal with the slings and arrows that life and fate have chosen to throw at her, and she would be very angry, if she wasn’t so busy being confused. Maybe it’s something that no-one fully understands and that’s why nobody has bothered to tell her about it. Perhaps people are too ashamed of their ignorance to discuss it and so there are no lectures or sermons or successful child rearing self-help books or even eighties power ballads on the subject – she swears that she will do something to change this but first she has to deal with her own problems.

She has made some major mistakes recently, mistakes that have hurt a lot of people, and although she tries to tell everyone that her motives were pure and just, no-one seems to believe her. Sadly, this is something else that she can’t really be angry about, why should others believe that she had good intentions when she can’t even convince herself that was the case. That said, she did truly believe that by going in search of Brooke’s mother that she was doing the right thing; what she doesn’t want to admit is that she may have done it for all the wrong reasons.

She wanted Brooke out of her family, that much is a universal truth and it’s not something that she ever kept secret. She was happier when it was just her and her mom, nowadays she feels that she is constantly vying for her mother’s attention, she is in an eternal delicatessen queue holding a number that never gets called and watching while the McQueen’s spend their life at the counter. Her faith in her mother is not so little that she believes she would ever really abandon her but she knows that her mother is wrapped up in her shiny new life and past events have taught her that when she competes with Brooke for anything, she is destined to lose and she didn’t think she could watch as her mother was taken in by the gleam of her new golden-haired child and she was pushed aside. Mike may say that he loves her and wants her to be part of the family but he will never be a substitute for her father and he doesn’t need, or perhaps even want, a daughter who is less than his version perfect. What she hadn’t anticipated on was just how much her mother loved the McQueen’s, she had thought that once it was just the two of them, her mother would come to her senses and everything would be alright but apparently you really can’t go home again. She never meant to cause her mother pain and now there is the baby to consider, she is not so selfish that she would let the child grow up without its father just because she doesn’t want Brooke to be her sister.

Which, as all her problems do, leads her back to Brooke. People might be a lot more accepting of her recent actions if they understood the reasons that she felt that she had to do everything in her power to stop Brooke officially becoming her sibling but she would rather everyone that she cares about hate her than have them learn what she has allowed to transpire between Brooke and herself. She can’t explain why she let Brooke touch her, she tries to tell herself that a good reporter will go to whatever lengths necessary to ensure that they learn all the relevant details about their subject but that would imply that she was prepared to spend her career prostituting herself in order to get the scoop on the big story of the day and she has no intention of doing that. She can almost believe that she saw it as an opportunity to feel popularity, even if it was vicarious and fleeting, she could walk down the halls of Kennedy and hear the remarks and jibes that the social elite hurled at her, all the while wearing the almost impenetrable amour of the knowledge that their chosen leader sneaks into her bed almost every single night. When she tries to apply a more clinical approach to the analysis of her actions, she can argue that Brooke was a convenient diversion who allowed her to explore her sexual desires without her having to detract time from her study, friends or extracurricular activities the way a real relationship would have.

It’s always irritating to learn that the adults are right to have warned you about something, especially when she was so sure that she knew better than her mother on the matter, but maybe she was too young to have sex, or a least too young to be able to distinguish sex from love. It took a long time for her to classify her activities with Brooke as sex, she told her self that they were just experimenting with heavy, heavy petting but that it certainly wasn’t sex and was most definitely not making love. Now she is not sure about any of that because when Brooke held her hand in the school corridor the other day for a second the entire world disappeared and there was nothing but the sensation of her hand in Brooke’s and the feeling that she never wanted this to end. She missed Brooke more than she imagined possible this summer and resented the number of nights that Brook spent with Kelly, bitterly aware of the fact that she wrought these changes on herself. 

Currently she lies on her bed at Chez Crack Whore, wondering how many times she can use the Magic Fingers before the whole thing collapses and lamenting the fact that in all likelihood she will never have Brooke in her bed again. Maybe she should have talked to Brooke about the nature of their relationship; she is sure that, despite the jock boyfriend that Miss McQueen has gone back to, she means something to Brooke. She was so sure that Brooke was using her, after all she was using Brooke, that she did everything in her power not to let Brooke in but she can’t deny that Brooke seemed hurt by being held at a distance and always seemed to want more. Brooke may approach carnal acts the way she approaches everything in her life, she is technical and perfunctory in her actions but she is thorough and she certainly delivers, Sam can almost imagine Brooke leafing through the Karma Sutra marking pages with colour coded post-its in order to ensure that she doesn’t disappoint but there were times, when Brooke would push the hair from her forehead or tell her that she was beautiful, that seemed so tender and in no way calculated that she can almost believe in those unguarded seconds she caught a glimpse of the real Brooke - these are moments that stay with her. She knows that some nights, when Brooke thought she was asleep, the blond would come into her room, curl up beside her and watch her for hours, she is not sure if Brooke ever suspected that she was awake but her behaviour never suggested that that was the case and regardless, she always gone before Sam woke in the morning, as though her visit was nothing but a dream. Sam thinks she will probably miss those quiet visits most of all. Her enforced stay in the Hotel de Felonies and Iniquity has at least given her plenty of time to think and she knows what she has to do, she has to put her family back together and she has to accept that Brooke can never be more to her than her step-sister, even if doing so will break her heart.


End file.
